MY WEIGHT ANNIHILATED.--"TELL ME," I CRIED IN ALARM, "IS THIS TO
BE A LIVING TOMB?"
"If you will reflect upon the condition we are now in, you will perceive
that it must be one of unusual scientific interest. If you imagine a
body at rest, in an intangible medium, and not in contact with a gas or
any substance capable of creating friction, that body by the prevailing
theory of matter and motion, unless disturbed by an impulse from
without, would remain forever at absolute rest. We now occupy such a
position. In whatever direction we may now be situated, it seems to us
that we are upright. We are absolutely without weight, and in a
perfectly frictionless medium. Should an inanimate body begin to revolve
here, it would continue that motion forever. If our equilibrium should
now be disturbed, and we should begin to move in a direction coinciding
with the plane in which we are at rest, we would continue moving with
the same rapidity in that direction until our course was arrested by
some opposing object. We are not subject to attraction of matter, for at
this place gravitation robs matter of its gravity, and has no influence
on extraneous substances. We are now in the center of gravitation, the
'Sphere of Rest.'"
"Let me think it out," I replied, and reasoning from his remarks, I
mentally followed the chain to its sequence, and was startled as
suddenly it dawned upon me that if his argument was true we must remain
motionless in this spot until death (could beings in conditions like
ourselves die beyond the death we had already achieved) or the end of
time. We were at perfect rest, in absolute vacancy, there being, as I
now accepted without reserve, neither gas, liquid, nor solid, that we
could employ as a lever to start us into motion. "Tell me," I cried in
alarm, "is this to be a living tomb? Are we to remain suspended here
forever, and if not, by what method can we hope to extricate ourselves
from this state of perfect quiescence?" He again took the bar of iron
from my hand, and cautiously gave it a whirling motion, releasing it as
he did so. It revolved silently and rapidly in space without support or
pivot.
"So it would continue," he remarked, "until the end of time, were it not
for the fact that I could not possibly release it in a condition of
absolute horizontal rest. There is a slight, slow, lateral motion that
will carry the object parallel with this sheet of energy to the material
side of this crevice, when its motion will 'be arrested by the earth it
strikes.'"
"That I can understand," I replied, and then a ray of light broke upon
me. "Had not Cavendish demonstrated that, when a small ball of lead is
suspended on a film of silk, near a mass of iron or lead, it is drawn
towards the greater body? We will be drawn by gravity to the nearest
cliff," I cried.
"You mistake," he answered; "Cavendish performed his experiments on the
surface of the earth, and there gravity is always ready to start an
object into motion. Here objects have no weight, and neither attract nor
repel each other. The force of cohesion holds together substances that
are in contact, but as gravitation can not now affect matter out of
molecular contact with other forms of matter, because of the equilibrium
of all objects, so it may be likewise said, that bodies out of contact
have at this point no attraction for one another. If they possessed this
attribute, long ago we would have been drawn towards the earth cliff
with inconceivable velocity. However, if by any method our bodies should
receive an impulse sufficient to start them into motion, ever so gently
though it be, we in like manner would continue to move in this
frictionless medium--until--"
"We would strike the material boundary of this crevice," I interrupted.
"Yes; but can you conceive of any method by which such voluntary motion
can now be acquired?"
"No."
"Does it not seem to you," he continued, "that when skillful mechanics
on the earth's surface are able to adjust balances so delicately that in
the face of friction of metal, friction of air, inertia of mass, the
thousandth part of a grain can produce motion of the great beams and
pans of such balances, we, in this location where there is no friction
and no opposing medium--none at all--should be able to induce mass
motion?"
"I can not imagine how it is possible, unless we shove each other apart.
There is no other object to push against,--but why do you continue to
hold me so tightly?" I interrupted myself to ask, for he was clasping me
firmly again.
"In order that you may not leave me," he replied.
"Come, you trifle," I said somewhat irritated; "you have just argued
that we are immovably suspended in a frictionless medium, and fixed in
our present position; you ask me to suggest some method by which we can
create motion, and I fail to devise it, and almost in the same sentence
you say that you fear that I will leave you. Cease your incongruities,
and advise with me rationally."
"Where is the bar of iron?" he asked.
I turned towards its former location; it had disappeared.
"Have you not occasionally felt," he asked, "that in your former life
your mind was a slave in an earthly prison? Have you never, especially
in your dreams, experienced a sensation of mental confinement?"
"Yes."
"Know then," he replied, "that there is a connection between the mind
and the body of mortal beings, in which matter confines mind, and yet
mind governs matter. How else could the will of men and animals impart
voluntary motion to earthy bodies? With beings situated as are the
animals on the surface of the earth, mind alone can not overcome the
friction of matter. A person could suspend himself accurately on a
string, or balance himself on a pivot, and wish with the entire force of
his mind that his body would revolve, and still he would remain at
perfect rest."
"Certainly. A man would be considered crazy who attempted it," I
answered.
"Notwithstanding your opinion, in time to come, human beings on the
surface of the earth will investigate in this very direction," he
replied, "and in the proper time mental evolution will, by
experimentation, prove the fact of this mind and matter connection, and
demonstrate that even extraneous matter may be made subservient to mind
influences. On earth, mind acts on the matter of one's body to produce
motion of matter, and the spirit within, which is a slave to matter,
moves with it. Contraries rule here. Mind force acts on pure space
motion, moving itself and matter with it, and that, too, without any
exertion of the material body which now is a nonentity, mind here being
the master."
"How can I believe you?" I replied.
"Know, then," he said, "that we are in motion now, propelled by my will
power."
"Prove it."
"You may prove it yourself," he said; "but be careful, or we will
separate forever."
Releasing his grasp, he directed me to wish that I were moving directly
to the right. I did so; the distance widened between us.
"Wish intensely that you would move in a circle about me."
I acquiesced, and at once my body began to circle around him.
"Call for the bar of iron."
I did as directed, and soon it came floating out of space into my very
hand.
"I am amazed," I ejaculated; "yes, more surprised at these phenomena
than at anything that has preceded."
"You need not be; you move now under the influences of natural laws that
are no more obscure or wonderful than those under which you have always
existed. Instead of exercising its influence on a brain, and thence
indirectly on a material body, your mind force is exerting its action
through energy on matter itself. Matter is here subservient. It is
nearly the same as vacuity, mind being a comprehensive reality. The
positions we have heretofore occupied have been reversed, and mind now
dominates. Know, that as your body is now absolutely without weight, and
is suspended in a frictionless medium, the most delicate balance of a
chemist can not approach in sensitiveness the adjustment herein
exemplified. Your body does not weigh the fraction of the millionth part
of a grain, and where there is neither material weight nor possible
friction, even the attrition that on surface earth results from a needle
point that rests on an agate plate is immeasurably greater in
comparison. Pure mind energy is capable of disturbing the equilibrium
of matter in our situation, as you have seen exemplified by our
movements and extraneous materials, 'dead matter' obeys the spiritual.
The bar of iron obeyed your call, the spiritless metal is subservient to
the demands of intelligence. But, come, we must continue our journey."
Grasping me again, he exclaimed: "Wish with all intensity that we may
move forward, and I will do the same."
I did so.
"We are now uniting our energies in the creation of motion," he said;
"we are moving rapidly, and with continually accelerated speed; before
long we will perceive the earthy border of this chasm."
And yet it seemed to me that we were at perfect rest.